USA's Total Power Use The following images explain a little about America's energy use and how much is wasted as heat due to the confines of physics. The next two pictures depicts just one square mile in the desert. Surely, there is plenty of room for thousands of such. It is estimated that each sq mi covered with mirrors would generate over 500 MW. This estimate would be 4 times greater if no space was allowed for access and shadows. 10,000 square miles are depicted in the following two images (thanks Google!) Here's a more direct look from space... (thanks Paint shop pro!) This is a lot of land which if trampled over by bull dozers (for any reason), can cause controversy. I agree that we shouldn't destroy habitat, even if it doesn't seem very habitable. An obvious objection to that is all the suburban crawl (Googled) just next to this area. Within the housed over areas, there is no hope for natural restoration (unless everyone shares their backyards with the wild). There is room for natural coexistence within the space of mirrors that are Post erected! The ground under the mirrors should be transversable by native species. So much energy is available from the deserts open areas that any argument can be quelled successfully. Such as "After a powerplant uses steam to produce electricity, that steam needs to be cooled further to continue the cycle. Where do you get all the extra water for the cooling process? Also, with so many mirrors, where is that water going to come from?". The answer would be something as follows "Since there is over twice the juice we now use just in a theoritical 100 x 100 mile square at current (or late '80's) tech, we could literally reverse osmosis all the water we need from the oceans. However, it would probably be easier to just pipe in ocean water directly for the cooling process. In the process, it (also) turns into steam and is distilled. This water would be used for cleaning, ect". We will probably have to do distill more water anyways to quench growth at current global rates!   < < < > > >